Homecoming
by SteveGarbage
Summary: The castle was taken in a cowardly ambush deep in the night. Blight swept through Ferelden. Arl Howe had been slain, a new King restored and the Blight ended. Now Fergus Cousland must return home, to his lands he left many months ago, to reclaim what is left of his shattered house.
1. Chapter 1

The streets were quiet, empty, with only a few people looking out from doorways and windows.

Normally, the main road in Highever would be crowded with tradesmen and sellers hawking wares. But the air here was thick with dread and sorrow. The Blight had taken what it had.

Rendon Howe had taken the rest.

The tall towers of Castle Cousland loomed just ahead, dark stone jutting into the overcast sky. The banners that flew above the ramparts bore the brown bear. Only a few soldiers walked the tall walls. The gates had been shut for months, no one coming in, only few going out.

Above the gates, several decomposing bodies were still strung up by their necks.

Several adults.

One child.

His child.

Fergus Cousland rolled his fingers into a fist, his eyes locked on the small frame of the child, hanging lifeless, flesh rotted and mottled, wounds of where birds had picked skin and muscle from bones.

The column of soldiers stopped behind him in the marketplace as he stared down the gates of the castle. His home. His land. His right. His horror.

The few guards atop the walls scurried in alarm, shouting and running back and forth over the battlements. They blew horns and rang bells and staked up at the walls with bows and crossbows in hand.

Fergus had called every available man still sworn to his family. King Alistair had provided a legion of soldiers. Bann Alfstanna had called what forces were left from Waking Sea. Arl Bryland brought every man left from the shattered South Reach. Bann Franderel of West Hill did not come himself, but sent a wing of his keep's well-trained archers. And the Chasind allies he had forged in the south were here.

He would tear down every stone of the castle if needed in order to furrow out the Howe rats.

The archers on the walls were shouting and then suddenly withdrew. There were more horns blowing from within the castle. Within a minute, there were no soldiers on the walls.

"They're withdrawing," Arl Bryland said, stepping up next to Fergus. Leonas had served in the rebellion with both his father and Howe. His sister had married Rendon, birthed his children. But Leonas had fiercely denounced the cowardly attack and pledged his support to the Couslands, even as darkspawn burned and killed everything in his lands in the south. "I wager they'll flee out of the postern gate."

Fergus' eyes were locked on the swaying corpses hanging from the walls. They were so badly gone that he couldn't make out the shapes, not from this distance. His father, his mother, Aedan and Oriana were surely there somewhere. But he could only stare at the small boy, the only one he knew, just by the size.

Oren. His boy.

"Intercept them," Fergus ordered, his fist shaking at his hip as he stared at the hanging boy. His boy. He raised his voice, shouting loud enough so that every soldier behind him could hear him with clear intent. "I want _every_ Howe! I want them _all_ and I want them _alive_! Every last one!"

Leonas nodded. "You heard the Teyrn!"

The soldiers hooted in acknowledgment and their lines spilled forward, hundreds of soldiers charging the castle, armor clattering as they rushed forward, horses streaking past ahead of the foot soldiers.

Fergus did not move as the waves of fighters streamed past him. He did not attack.

He stood.

Staring.


	2. Chapter 2

The sun had set hours ago and Fergus still sat, looking at the blood stains upon the floor.

This was his bedchamber. His wife would have been sleeping here. His boy in the next room.

The two bloody stains were just feet apart. Just before the door. One small reddish-brown mark on the stone, a larger darker stain on the carpet nearby.

 _Will you bring me back a sward?_

The room was covered in darkness. He had not lit a torch or candle. The sky was covered in cloud, obscuring the moon and stars. Light rain had begun to fall in the evening. Fergus could not see the bloody marks in the room any more, but he knew they were there.

Mother Mallol - thank the Maker the bastards had at least spared her life - had begged him not to go upstairs. She had pleaded for him not to subject himself the horrors of the castle, to stay in Highever until the servants could cleanse the bloodied keep.

Fergus had stopped in the doorway and fallen to his knees on the floor, staring down at the bloody stains. His fists were so tight, his arms shook. He ducked his head, his teeth locked together, lips curled and quivering, his eyes clenched closed so tight, trying to hold back the tears.

He failed.

Howls of agony filled the empty corridors of the castle.

He had dragged himself to the table, pulled himself to the chair and sat. His eyes were unfocused, looking in the direction of the bloody marks, but he did not see them. He saw nothing but haze. His mind was empty. His body felt number.

"My lord," the voice came at the door. Arl Bryland stood in the threshold, his dark armor showing fresh silver dings where he had been hit by blades. "The Howes have been defeated."

"How many?" Fergus growled.

"Seventeen, my lord," Leonas said. "We attempted to take them all alive, but eight more resisted and were killed. We lost five men in the pursuit, my lord."

"You are certain you have all of them?" Fergus said, his eyes still blankly staring ahead.

"Yes, my lord. We are sure," Leonas said.

"That will be all," Fergus said, lifting his hand slightly to shoo the Arl away. Leonas bowed and quickly exited. He was a good man.

 _Watch over our sons, husbands, and fathers and bring them safely back to us._

Oriana had prayed that small prayer just before his departure.

Fergus had returned safely from the south.

Alone.


	3. Chapter 3

His eyes had opened slightly, crusty, weak. Fergus looked up at the ceiling, a crude crisscross of sticks, sod and mud. The air stank of damp and rot. His entire body felt like it was on fire.

"Oriana…" he muttered, struggling to get the words through parched lips.

There was a wooden cup at his lips, tipping slightly. Fergus felt the cool touch of water at his lips. He tried to swallow, choking as gagging as the the first gulp of water hit his parched throat. He coughed, tried to sit but a firm hand planted in the center of his chest, pushing him back down.

"Rest." It was a woman's voice, quiet and gentle. Her hand on his chest was firm and strong, but caring. Her voice was foreign and wild. "You were badly hurt in a darkspawn ambush. Their poisons are potent. You are still very ill."

"How … long?"

He could barely feel her fingers touching parts of his body. His armor and clothes had all been stripped away, only a thin cloth covered him for modesty. "It has been two weeks," she said. "This is the first time you have woken. You are in a Chasind village. We are safe here, for now."

Fergus could feel a stabbing pain as she dabbed lightly at one place near his hip. He grimaced, trying to twist away from her, but her strong hand held him steady against the bed. "Please. Rest."

It was weeks before Fergus had the strength to stand. The darkspawn poisons were so potent that his healer - her name was Zorana - said it could be moons before he fully recovered.

* * *

"You are a Chieftain, then?" Varhir's face was almost totally covered with black tattoos, marks of pride he had earned in years of battle. He wore a flatblade across his back, a prize and symbol of his status as one of the tribe's finest warriors.

"Not exactly," Fergus explained as he sat around the fire, nursing a cup of the potent Wildwine. The Chasind drank it down as if it were water. The grain alcohol was many times stronger than even the most potent wines in Highever. He had made the mistake of sipping too deeply the first time they had passed him a cup and spent the rest of the evening heaving his guts in the bushes to raucous laughter of the Chasind. "My father, Bryce, is the Teyrn. He leads our family. Many other lesser rulers swear oaths to him. He is the most powerful man in Ferelden, excepting the King, of course."

"This Bryce, he must be a fearsome fighter, to become such a powerful Chieftain," said Torar. His giant maul was shaped like a bear's head, fearsome teeth bared and snarling.

Fergus nodded. "He is." The Chasind respected strength of arms almost more than anything. His father had been a soldier and fought with the King, but he was only average with a sword. "Quite mighty."

"Do you have a boy of your own?" Varhir asked.

Fergus nodded, feeling warm inside when he thought of little Oren, so eager to learn the blade and how to ride. His tutors needed to drill him harder on his speech, but otherwise he was shaping up as well as any other Cousland.

He had given Oriana quite a tumble on his last night. Fergus hoped when he returned from the south he would have another boy on the way. Oriana wanted a girl. He couldn't blame her. Between him and Aedan and Oren shaping up to be another of the boys, his wife was praying for some relief. But Couslands notoriously sired boys. It was just the way of the line, why it had held so strong for hundreds of years.

"Let's hope he's a better fighter than his father," Varhir joked, slapping Fergus on the back. They had been teasing him about the darkspawn ambush for weeks now.

They would make their way from the Wilds the next day.

* * *

The skins hanging over the entry of the hut had moved, the cool, damp air flooding in. He lay awake, unable to sleep, only thinking of the journey home.

Zorana, his healer, his tender, slipped through the darkness, touching his body lightly as she climbed into the small, rough bed. She knew he was awake. She bent low, planting a soft kiss upon his lips. Her mouth moved, kissing his cheek, her tongue slipped into his ear.

"Take me tonight, my lord," she whispered as she nibbled his ear.

The Chasind were a bold people. The warriors had commented at the glances the healer cast at him, the way the other women of the village all stared and spoke of him, a handsome foreigner fallen upon their home as if by a wish and a dream. Zorana had the right, they said. She had healed him. She had the privilege of the first move.

She bent back, straddling his waist, slipping her arms from her sleeves and letting the roughspun shirt fall down off her chest. She grabbed his hands, pressing them against her hips, tracing the curve of her waist and pushing his hands into her breast, tossing her head back with a sigh of release at his touch.

Her hips ground into him, her bare legs rubbing against the worn cloth of his pants. Her browned skin was barely visible in the dim, her thin body well toned, her small breast firm under his hands. She was young and lithe, nubile and willing, a dream and prize to any of the warriors in the village but she had stayed their advances for moons, her eyes only for one man.

"Stop," Fergus said, rolling his fingers back as best he could under her hands, letting his arms droop. He turned his head away to look at the wall of the hut and not gaze upon her bareness.

Zorana let his hands go, his arms quickly retreating to his sides. She leaned forward slightly, her hands placed upon the muscles of his chest. "Please, my lord," Zorana pleaded. "I have long waited for this night, thought about your touch every day that I tended to your wounds, watched as you regained your strength."

Fergus had joked before leaving Highever about wenching his way south and through the army camp. He might have even meant it, he wasn't so sure. The Blight, the war, had all seemed like a game. Knights and soldiers marshaled in carefully arranged columns and rows, made up for war, riding off to battle like the tales.

He closed his eyes and as he could feel the touch and weight of Zorana atop him, he could only think of Oriana.

"No," Fergus said firmly. "I took oaths and swore vows to honor my lady wife, the mother of my child."

Fergus turned his head to look at Zorana, lifting his hand to place it atop hers. "I cannot thank you enough for my health, my very life. You are a beautiful and caring woman, but I have but one true love, and I cannot betray her years of love and trust in me. I'm sorry."

Zorana smiled and planted a kiss upon his cheek. She lifted her leg, slipping off the side of the bed as she grabbed her clothes. She crossed her arms to cover herself.

"You are a good man, my lord," she said, although her voice seemed filled with sadness. "Your wife, your Oriana, she is good to have you."

The healer turned toward the entryway, slipping back into her shirt as she exited into the chill of night.


	4. Chapter 4

Five bodies sat upon the pyre, wrapped in snow-white cloth.

It had taken some of the men nearly a day to haul in all the bodies hanging from the walls. Fergus regretted sending the men to do such filthy work, but he wanted them down immediately. Fergus stood on the battlements, looking down on Highever as the men worked. With the blue and silver banners of the Cousland family once again flying over the towers, life had returned to the city below.

Fergus stood close by as the men pulled in the ropes, as they laid the mangled bodies down on the stone, covering their mouths as not to gag from the smell.

Fergus made sure to look at each body.

The Howes had done this. Killed each one. Left them to hang. Let the sun roast them, the rain pummel them, the birds to pick at them. Some were so decomposed that he couldn't recognize them any more, but many still retained at least some feature that Fergus could tell.

Leonas had shouted with joy as Fergus strode into the remains of Denerim weeks past. The Arl had hugged him - odd, Fergus thought.

"Fergus, thank the Maker you're safe! I thought we had lost all of you," Leonas had said.

"All of us?" Fergus asked, confused.

"Oh Maker, you haven't heard?" Leonas' face soured quickly, eyes suddenly downcast, smile fading and his entire posture slumping.

"What is it, Leonas? Has something happened?" When the Arl didn't answer immediately, Fergus grabbed him by the arms and shook him. "Tell me!"

His tongue choked in his throat when they pulled up the first of his family - his mother, Eleanor.

 _Be well, my son. I will pray for your safety every day you are gone._

She was still wearing bits and pieces of her leather armor. Mother had been quite a raider before settling down and marrying. She must have tried to fight off the Howes when the castle was stormed. Her throat was cut. She had been executed.

Fergus could not restrain himself when they dragged in Oriana second. He crouched low to the ground, his hand holding just above the mutilated flesh. The putrid smell of her body was nauseating. He wanted to hold her, to cradle her in his arms, but the corpse was so vile he could only sit, tears running down his cheeks and look with horror upon her form.

Immediately after, they pulled in Oren.

"My boy," Fergus said weakly to no one but himself, crumpling to his knees next to the body. "Leave me," he ordered to the men. "Just for a few moments."

The men gladly walked away from their grim duty.

The boy, he was just a boy, had a gaping sword wound in his gut. His throat was cut. His flesh was puffy and grey. The body reeked. The flesh across the boy's face was mostly gone, what was left was shrunken and leathery.

 _Why would they do this to my boy?_ Fergus asked himself, but there was no answer.

Arl Howe was dead. The Warden had killed him in the dungeons of his estate in Denerim. He had been torturing others. Fergus cursed him, wishing the Arl was still alive so he could drive a sword through the man's heart himself.

His father had told him stories, he and Howe, both young men, fighting the Orlesians. They had saved each other a dozen times over. They were one of the few survivors of the battle of White River. His father always said Rendon was changed after then. That something had snapped within him. Surrounded by a massacre, Howe couldn't handle the carnage.

And yet, the Arl had massacred the entire castle. He had struck a cowardly blow against an ally, massacred innocents and mutilated bodies, for what? A mad grab at power?

This was the cost. His boy. Oren.

He was teyrn, but he ruled nothing.

The torch in his hand felt like it weighed more than a greatsword. Fergus was sweating from the blazing flames, staring at the five bodies wrapped in cloth and set atop the pyre. Bryce, Eleanor, Aeden, Oriana and Oren.

Mother Mallol would give a memorial tomorrow in Highever to let the city mourn the loss of the Couslands, but Fergus had wanted the funeral to be small. It was only he and the other banns and arls who had come with the army. He couldn't stomach more than that.

"Beloved Maker, we commit these bodies to the flame, that they may return to your side as your bride, our savior, the blessed Andraste, Mother of Ferelden. Though the lives of these Couslands were taken unjustly from us, we ask that you let them find peace at your side," Mallol said.

There was a long pause.

"Whenever you are ready, Fergus," Mallol said, touching his wrist.

Could you ever be ready for this moment, he wondered. The courtyard was darkness except for the torch he and the other nobles held. He had been to funerals before, watched widows weep and children sob, but never for his own kin before.

His legs were weak, but he took one step forward. And another. His eyes were fixed upon the white bundles, even as he dipped the torch down into the wood and oil below. The other nobles had converged too, each lowering the flame as the pyre began to burn brightly.

Mallol began to recite the chant loudly over the roaring of the flames, the cracking of wood and spitting of ash.

 _O Maker, hear my cry:  
_ _Guide me through the blackest nights  
_ _Steel my heart against the temptations of the wicked  
_ _Make me to rest in the warmest places._

The flames were growing larger. They licked the cloth of the funeral bundles, scorching the bottoms of the cloth black. His younger brother, Aedan, was closest to the flame, the first to be claimed. He had been a fine man. Some had thought that one day he might rule instead of Fergus.

Aedan's body was marked with several wounds. He must have tried to fight his way out of hte castle. He had so many slashes and stabs, he certainly fought to his last breath, until his strength gave out and he could step no further.

 _O Creator, see me kneel:  
_ _For I walk only where You would bid me  
_ _Stand only in places You have blessed  
_ _Sing only the words You place in my throat_

The flames jumped up around his father. Fergus had left just hours before with most of the army. Bryce was bringing the remainder of the force and planned to march with his friend and ally. His body had a sword wound at the right hip, a blade that had pierced the soft flash all the way through to his back. He had still been wearing his normal clothes. He hadn't even made it to his armor.

 _My Maker, know my heart  
_ _Take from me a life of sorrow  
_ _Lift me from a world of pain  
_ _Judge me worthy of Your endless pride_

How far had he made it from the castle before Howe attacked? Fergus couldn't recall hearing the blare of horns of the sounds of a fight. It was night, Mallol had said. Fergus had to have been miles south, probably setting up camp and tapping the first of many kegs of ale they had shared along the road. He was merrymaking, oblivious, while his loved ones were being brutally murdered.

 _My Creator, judge me whole:  
_ _Find me well within Your grace  
_ _Touch me with fire that I be cleansed  
_ _Tell me I have sung to Your approval_

The flames were so high and the smoke so thick, he could no longer see the bodies within. Fergus's breath was shallow, short. His vision blurred with tears. He could not catch his breath, his chest convulsed and wracked with sobs. Perhaps it was weakness to grieve so openly among the other nobles, but Fergus could not stop himself.

 _O Maker, hear my cry:  
_ _Seat me by Your side in death  
_ _Make me one within Your glory  
_ _And let the world once more see Your favor_

His hands covered his face. Mallol's voice faltered, he could hear. A small whine came from his lungs, one he could not stop. His father's admiration. The loving hugs of his mother. His brother's smile as they crossed blades in the yard. The soft touch of Oriana's fingers upon his cheek. The excited squeals of Oren as he ran around the castle.

All gone.

 _For You are the fire at the heart of the world  
_ _And comfort is only Yours to give._

The Howes would pay.


	5. Chapter 5

The mob was angry, shouting, throwing rocks and whatever they could get their hands on.

Seventeen men wore nooses.

He had dragged all of the men in chains through the city streets to the market square. They had cleared all of the stalls away and the carpenters had quickly erected a stage and gallows large enough to hold every man.

"Don't do this, Fergus. Calm your heart," Mallol had asked.

"They killed everyone in this castle. If you did not wear those robes, they would have killed you too," he growled. "They all must die."

Fergus had donned his veridium armor. He had not cleaned or repaired the green plate and chain. He wanted everyone to see it in this state, as a reminder that while murder was occurring here, he had been in the south fighting. He wore the Cousland family blade at his hip. They had not been able to plunder the treasury, although the scratched and dents in the thick door showed it was not for a lack of trying.

There was still a thin plume of black smoke rising from the castle upon the hill. The funeral had been three days past, but he had ordered they burn a pyre for five nights. It was nearing noon, but the previous night's fire was still fading in the castle.

Bann Alfstanna stood at his side. Among the dead had been some fighters from Waking Sea who had been called by the teyrn, and she wanted justice as badly as Fergus. Alfstanna had offered to personally lead a hunt to find Howe's surviving children Nathaniel and Delilah.

Fergus had drawn the line there. No one else, not even the Howes, deserved to lose sons and daughters to senseless murder.

Leonas stepped forward to the center of the stage before the crowd which grew silent as his lifted a hand to silence them. He unrolled the scroll, summoning his largest voice to boom across the market.

"By order of Teyrn Fergus Cousland, first of his name, Lord of Highever, Teyrn of the North, faithful servant of King Alistair Theirin, I hereby condemn these seventeen men to death for the murders of Teyrn Bryce Cousland, Teyrna Eleanor Cousland, Aedan Cousland, Oriana Cousland, Oren Cousland and numerous knights, soldiers, servants and retainers of the teyrnir.

"For these crimes, these seventeen men shall be executed by hanging by the neck until dead."

The crowd cheered, roaring in approval. More rocks flew, striking some of the accused standing upon the platform. Fergus had the men gagged so they could not spew their lies, hate and vitriol upon the platform. Their muffled cries of pain as they were hit with stones were all that could be heard.

Leonas raised his hand to quiet the crowd, but there was still a quiet hum as the gathered townsfolk and soldiers continued amongst themselves. "I shall now read the names of the condemned, that the Maker may hear their names and reject their souls."

Leonas began to read the names, but Fergus wasn't listening. The crowd began to murmur and shout again as Leonas rattled off the names. Most of the men were still, eyes blankly staring off into the distance. Some squirmed, twisting their bound hands behind their backs, bound feet awkwardly shifting back and forth upon the platform.

One of the younger men was crying, his shoulder and head shaking wildly. His throat clenched and puffed and his entire body was shaking back and forth, struggling within the noose. Fergus was too far away, but it looked as if he was screaming, muffled as it was with the gag.

Fergus stepped out onto the platform, staring daggers at each of the men he passed, his brow hard and down. There was blood on all of their hands. Some of their eyes had fear in it, others still defiant. Leonas had finished reading the list of names as Fergus stopped before the young man who was struggling. Fergus had his back to the crowd, but he lifted his hand to quiet them. The entire crowd fell silent.

The young man was indeed trying to shout something, muffled shouts coming through the cloth filling his mouth. Fergus reached up, grabbing the cloth and gave it a hard pull, ripping it out of the man's mouth. Pleas instantly flooded the air.

"Please, my lord. Mercy! I beg you for mercy! I am just a soldier. I was only following orders! I didn't want to do it! It was wrong! It was horror! My lord, mercy! Mercy!" The young was man wildly screaming, tears were still coming out of the corners of his eyes.

"Did you take part in this ambush?" Fergus asked, his eyes narrow and his voice stern and cold.

"Yes, my lord. But I did not-"

Fergus cut him off. "Then you will receive the same kind of mercy that you showed my family!" Fergus said, lifting his arm and backhanding the young man across the mouth.

The lad spat blood and sobbed, but he did not abate. "Please, my lord! I am just a simple soldier. It was the Bastard. The Bastard is the one responsible! He's the one who killed your wife and your son!"

Fergus was ready to hit him again, but stopped. He looked down the line of condemned. "Which one is this Bastard?" Fergus demanded.

The young man jerked his head to the right anxiously, twisting his whole body. "The older one with the grey beard. Down that way," he said, jerking his head again. "Please, my lord. I was only following his orders. Mercy. Mercy!"

Fergus stepped back to his left, looking at the men. Three away, there was an older man, clearly a veteran soldier from the marks of scars on his face. He had greyed whiskers, patchy and twisted on his chin. He was one who stared straight ahead, head lifted slightly, defiantly in spite of his condition. Fergus reached up and ripped the gag out of his mouth.

"The lad down there calls you the Bastard?" Fergus asked.

"Aye."

"He says you are the one responsible for killing my wife and my boy?"

"Aye," he said simply again and lifted his chin even higher, his eyes cast up to the sky.

Fergus jerked forward, grabbing the man's hair and his chin and pulling his head down so the man could stare him in the eye. He held the man's head tightly in his grips, shaking him. "Why? Why did you do it? They were innocent, you fucking animal!"

The Bastard snorted. He laughed. "Then maybe we're alike, Cousland. Because it takes a fucking animal to hang a man approaching his ninetieth year."

Arl Tarleton Howe had sided with the Orlesians during the rebellion. The Couslands called their banners with the King. His family had seized Harper's Ford, capturing the arl in the battle. Howe was elderly, but still spry enough to lead troops and strategize against his own countrymen. The Couslands strung him up for treason. But all that occurred well before Fergus was even born.

But as he looked at the Bastard, he guessed he might have been a young man during the rebellion. A veteran. A man who fought for the losing side but lived to tell about it.

"Tarleton was a traitor. He betrayed Ferelden. Not even his own kin supported him. Rendon fought with my father, he fought for the King!" Fergus was shouting. The crowd had grown quiet behind him, listening to the exchange.

The Bastard shrugged his shoulders as much as he could in his state. "Blood is blood," he said. Then he smirked, raising his chin just a little higher as the smile stretched across his lips. "You should have seen how wide the boy's eyes got when I stuck that sword in his gut. Your wife, she tried to plead for her life, down on her knees and swearing anything to try to bargain her life. Didn't work though, did it?"

Fergus' hand was instinctively on his sword before he knew it, the blade sliding swiftly out of the scabbard at his hip. He wasn't thinking. There was only rage.

He drove the point of the blade into the bastard's gut, pushing the sword harder and harder until he could feel the edge sliding out of man's back. He sunk the sword down to the crossguard, he could feel hot blood dripping across his fist as he continued to jam the sword in, pressing down even though it had no where else to go.

The Bastard was screaming, but he could scarcely hear it over the mixed cacophony of gasps, cries and cheers from the gathered crowd in the square.

Fergus' eyes were locked in on the Bastard, delighting in the agony that replaced the defiance that had been across the man's face just moments before. Drool dripped from his mouth, his eyes were wide and his entire body shook, cold sweat dripping off him as his body went into shock.

The teyrn twisted his wrist sharply, the blade rotating just slightly in the soft gut on the Howe soldier. The Bastard's breath caught, his choked and coughed, blood begin to spill out of his lips.

Fergus' hand was drenched in blood. The smell of iron and bile filled his nostrils.

He pulled the blade and stabbed again, driving the sword through a second time. His arm tore back and he stabbed again, and again, and again. He grunted with exertion each time he drove the sword in, watching the twisting, writhing agony on the Bastard's face.

There were hands on his shoulders, pulling him away, a strong hand wrenched his hand off the sword.

Fergus' eyes never moved.

Leonas and Alfstanna were dragging him away. The crowd was quiet.. The Bastard's body seized and shook.

The Cousland family blade remained lodged in his gut, bloody crossguard and grip protruding from his soft belly.

Leonas and Alfstanna let him go, having dragged him several feet away. Fergus looked down the line of condemned Howes, each of them standing on the platform, ropes coiled around their necks, eyes filled with fear after witnessing the gruesome display.

What had the bastard said?

 _Blood is blood._

"Hang them all!" Fergus boomed, his voice exploding out of his throat, primal, filled with unchecked rage.

The crowd did not cheer, as he expected.

The young lad gave a dreadful wail, calling for mercy with his last breath.

The platform dropped. Seventeen men fell, ropes tightening at their throat as they jerked and bobbed, bodies thrashing as the noose cut off their airways.

No stones flew overhead. No jeers were being screamed. The Howes struggled futilely.

All Fergus could see where the dozens of rotting bodies swaying from the walls of Castle Cousland.

All Fergus could see was that small frame, the body of a boy, dangling dead from the ramparts.


	6. Chapter 6

The moon hung high in the sky, but sleep eluded him once more.

He had wandered down from his chambers, traversing the empty, hauntingly quiet corridors of the castle. A week had passed since the hanging, but every day he could see the hanging bodies, struggling, swinging, swaying and shaking, until one by one they each turned blue and grew still.

Fergus had stood on the platform, watching, waiting until each of the seventeen men expired.

The Bastard died first.

One by one, the soldiers cut down the corpses.

The axeman took the heads off each body. They burned the corpses. Fergus had every skull placed in its own box and sent to Amaranthine.

Rendon was dead. Fergus didn't care. His message was clear.

If even one more drop of Cousland blood was spilled, he would not rest until all of the arling was devoid of life, nothing but a wasteland of smoldering ash littered with the bones and bodies of the vanquished.

There were no more innocents.

Fergus sat in the main hall, crouched in the intricate and gilded throne. Every teyrn had ruled this land from that chair, an ancient seat of power that had held a Cousland for hundreds of years.

The Cousland blade stood between his legs, point of the scabbard resting on the ground. His wrists dangled over the crossguard, his hands clasped together, his forehead resting upon the pommel. Fergus rocked back and forth slightly, his mind racing, calling out to the Maker, searching for answers.

There was only silence, an empty void where only he persisted.

There was work to be done. He would need to appoint a new household staff, repopulate the household guard, the city watch and his personal army. He would need to meet with all of the arls, banns and freeholders sworn directly to his house.

He would need to remarry.

To sire a new heir.

To preserve the line.

"I am glad to see your faith has not left you," Mother Mallol's voice said from the darkness. Fergus could hear her steps approaching up the main walkway of the hall, each step echoing loudly in the empty chamber. "It is being tested, now, more than ever."

Mallol had been like a second mother to him. She had educated him from his youth, always been there with a kind word and a guiding hand to shape him into the man he had become. She had been his moral compass and given strength to both his father and mother in trying times.

She was the only one left. Everyone else had been given over to sword and flame.

"I hear nothing but silence, Mallol," Fergus said, lifting his head from his prayers. "Why? Why has the Holy Bride forsaken me?"

Her hands were folded at her waist as she approached with the measured gate of a lifelong service to the Chantry. "We cannot know the workings of Andraste. But she hears your prayers. She knows your anguish, Fergus."

"No one knows!" he snapped, he pulled his hands up, letting the sword teeter and fall to the stone with a loud clatter.

Mallol's mouth turned to a scowl as she approached closer, placing her hand on the top of Fergus' head. It was the same gesture she would make when separating Fergus and Aedan as they squabbled, or to quiet them during lessons. Her long, aged fingers stretched through his hair, holding his head softly.

Aedan had been a better student and a better fighters, but Fergus was the charmer, the speaker and the humorist. Mallol had struggled to instruct him, but she had never lost her patience, only turning her mouth in that same frown she wore now.

Fergus felt nine years old again.

"Do not have so much pride to think you are alone in this," Mallol said in that soft, motherly voice again. "There have been others who have lost as much or more. My heart aches just as raw for your family. Your mother and father took me into their house when I was fresh out of the seminary and treated me as one of their own. I raised you and your brother like my own two children.

"Consider yourself lucky that you were not here to experience the horrors yourself," she said. Her voice wavered. "I sometimes wish the Maker had called me to his side with everyone else instead of leaving me here. But I think he left me here, for you."

Fergus closed his eyes and let out a long sigh. Mallol's touch was soothing, calming. She was right, as always.

"When will the pain stop, Mother?" he moaned.

Mallol stepped closer, taking cradling his head against her hip. "I don't know, child. I don't know it will ever stop hurting altogether, but the hurting will fade in time."

Fergus nuzzled into her hip. When he would get into a bad fight with Aedan or break something or do something he had felt guilty about, he would often run to Mallol to tell her. She would cradle the boy, tell him a story or remind him of the Chant and advise him to confess to his parents. She had often marched him, his hand in hers, to his parents and stood sentinel as he told them of his wrongs.

Bryce would dole out discipline, firm but fair, appreciative of his son's honesty and bravery.

Fergus had grown to be loyal, fair and just because of it.

The executions, those were not the child she had helped raise. The man who brutally stabbed the Howe until he had to be dragged away was not the person she had taught mercy and justice. The man who screamed with wild rage to have them hang was not the ruler she had helped to mold.

"How do I go on?" Fergus asked,

Mallol stroked the side of his head with her hand. She had wondered the same question. Servants were still scrubbing blood from the stone daily. The halls of the castle were nearly empty. Highever sat under an uneasy tension. While the people had reveled in the hanging, the crowd had soured quickly watching so many men hang, all struggling for life as it was choked from their throats.

Many had left in disgust before the deed was done. Some women wept. Parents covered their children's faces and turned toward home. Only a few men, guardsmen, veteran soldiers, family of those who had lost loved ones in the attack stayed to the bitter end.

"I don't know, my child," Mallol said, squeezing him closer. "You are a Cousland, the last of your line, but a Cousland still. You will find your way, in time."

Fergus' hand reached up, grabbing the cloth of her habit, pulled his whole body into her. His chest heaved as he clutched to her, fingers clawing to hold her.

She could feel tears on her hip.

His wailing sobs echoed through the emptiness of the great hall.


End file.
